NO GUNPLA for almost a month now...

I have been staying at work ( in the office ) since October 6 and it has been a while since I last blogged. Managed to squeeze a bit of time to blog today as there is a Halloween party of sorts here at work. We are currently working on a very complex project at work as of the moment, but I should return to Gunpla very soon.



GBWC 2014 was so much fun eventhough I failed to join for the 3rd straight year. My daughter won her 2nd bronze at GBWC 2014, she is asking for a trigger type airbrush this Christmas and vows to do better than bronze next year. Dang hobby gets more expensive every year.



I deeply apologise to all my clients whom I have pending commissioned works, will focus on my commission works once I return to Gunpla next month.



The GBWC 2014 here in the Philippines was extra special as I got Master Kawaguchi autographed all my ancient Gunpla trophies. Great stuff, hope to join next year's event with an entry.



Should make this space more active by next month.  Thanks as always for the support guys! :)

 

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Trick or Treat!

There's less than a week left til Halloween and we've got loads of goodies for all your DIY costumes needs, party decorations and spooky gifts. We'll be open regular store hours on Halloween and will be participating in the Trick or Treat Alberta Street festivities at our NE location: stop by from 3:30 until 6pm to trick or treat with us! We love seeing the costumes our customers come up with.

Alberta Halloween Hours: 10am - 8pm

Sellwood Halloween Hours: 10am - 6pm

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Oh, My Tin Heart!

If you've been a customer of ours for while, you may have noticed how much we love trinkets influenced by Central American cultures. We're really happy about all the new goodies we've got the stores brimming with. The above hearts and painted images below are all handmade in Mexico; the ornate hearts and birds come from Haiti. We hope to carry even more of these type of lovelies once we're finished with the expansion of our Alberta St. store.

In addition, we're stocked full of decorations for Halloween and Day of the Dead, which falls on Nov. 2nd this year. All of the below products are available at both locations!

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Utterly Sublime

We've recently picked up a more complete line of Sublime Stitching embroidery patterns and floss. Its hard to express how much we love this company and the genius behind Jenny Hart's amazing line. Created in Austin, Texas, Sublime Stitching includes patterns by Jenny herself along with some amazing illustrator friends, including Portland locals, Carson Ellis and Ryan Berkley. Hart has helped bring embroidery into the hands of the young and creative and we're so thrilled include it at both of our locations.

 

We've just concluded our September Collage Creative Challenge, which happened to be embroidery. The winner is a young customer of our Sellwood store, Siena who created her own design:

 

Be sure to check out October's Creative Challenge for your chance to win a $50 gift certificate to collage!

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Toymaker versus DC23 Facebook Page!

Me and Kenny Lim aka Toymaker has been chatting about our next Face Off / Build Off for some time now. We had our first duel back in 2011 using the Bandai MG The O and had so much fun in the process. 

Next year we plan to inspire each other further by doing small and quick build offs. We also plan to use the Bandai PG Unicorn as our main kit for our build off next year!!!

We will be posting old links and photos of our MG The O build off for the meantime... and will also update you regarding our up and coming PG Unicorn  build off in both our Facebook pages and our new page! Feel free to follow us at our new page below...

https://www.facebook.com/ToymakerVSdc23

Me and Toymaker ( Kenny Lim ) has been friends for years now. We have always chatted about concepts, skills and other people's work since 2009. We do hope you would enjoy following us next year at our new page! Possibly the first of its kind! 

Thanks as always for dropping by! Until next post guys! Just enjoy the hobby! :)

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Local Organizer did not allow me to join GBWC 2014!!!

The local organizer here in the Philippines did not allow me to join GBWC 2014, due to technical reasons. 

I basically misinterpreted the rules. I have the original 3 year old Bandai MG The O box ( as I do not buy bootlegs anyways ) and bought a kit of the same price at the event ( MG Sazabi verKa ) to qualify to join. I thought that buying a new kit from ToysR'Us ( the event sponsor ) will sort of give me a ticket to join GBWC. 

All in all I have spent around 12k worth of items at ToysR'Us to qualify to join. The local organizer told me that I should have the receipt of the MG The O, which is impossible as that kit is too old to have kept the receipt. Besides you don't normally buy Gunpla at malls as it is 40% more expensive than buying original Bandai sellers online.

Oh well. At least my daughter joined the contest. I fully understand the rules of the local organizer now. Only Gunpla bought at ToysR'Us are eligible to join the contest. You cannot even go to Japan and buy Bandai kits as you need to buy them from malls... The sad part is that because the local organizers are too strict, the turn around of participants every year is getting lower and lower. It worries me that fewer people are joining GBWC here in the Philippines... But very strict rules in joining does not help ( the photo below shows how few the participants are ). 

Well at least I and my daughter got a photo with Master Kawaguchi. And my daughter was allowed to enter GBWC Philippines 2014! 

Until next year guys! Will focus on my commissioned works from now on instead. :)

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